


Midnight Clear

by knitmeapony



Category: Batman (Comics), Captain America (comic)
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2007, recipient:Re_White
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-25
Updated: 2007-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-25 17:01:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/272659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knitmeapony/pseuds/knitmeapony
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A meeting on a rooftop, a shared sandwich, and the mission is go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Midnight Clear

**Author's Note:**

> Written with the fantastic baffledking as the Voice of Jason Todd.

Roofs weren't normally Bucky's thing, but sometimes the easiest way to get a good, sharp eye on someone was from above. People rarely looked up, and there were all kinds of exits if you knew how to fall. He crouched, patient enough that the snow that was slowly falling had started to build up on his shoulders. There were two men moving inside the building; he could tell that even with the lights out.

He wanted it down to one before he moved in. He just wanted a good look around, after all.

He lifted his head at a footfall, not sure if it came from the street below or somewhere closer...

...it was closer. Just behind Bucky, actually, and from the sight of the soft green shoes, the sound had to be deliberate. "I really hope you're lost and not a look out, kid." The boy standing behind him, arms crossed over his red chest, wasn't old enough to be using kid in that patronizing tone, much less staring at Bucky and tapping his toe impatiently.

Bucky looked faintly amused at the shoes but didn't move, keeping an eye on the building below. "Neither. I'm probably doing the same thing you are." A pregnant pause. "Kid." He jerked his head towards the building below. "Minetti's about to leave. Are you going in?"

"I _was_ going to but then the tourists started making trouble."

The kid's shoes shuffled, and Bucky caught the sight of a cape. Right, then. Robin. It could be worse. Bucky snorted. "I'm a lot of things." He adjusted his mask before he turned around. "But I'm not a tourist." He lifted his chin and picked up his backpack as he stood -- one clean, smooth motion. He gave the kid a once-over as he slung the thin backpack on. "Gotham may look like a foreign country, but it's still the States, last I checked."

"Are you from Gotham?"

"I'm not _from_ anywhere."

"Then you're a tourist." Jay wouldn't have been so casual if Batman wasn't around. He could all but see him. Hovering.

Bucky reached over his shoulder, into the backpack, and pulled out a collapsable grappling hook. He snapped the trigger and it popped open with a click. "Well, then, I'm going sight seeing." He shrugged. "You coming?"

Robin blinked, then recovered and moved forward. "Sure, I hear the nightlife here is killer."

Bucky snorted, amused, and hooked the line up easily, wrapping a gloved hand around the wire. "Don't you get enough puns in your life?" He backed up to the edge of the roof and pushed off, rappelling down in three smooth motions.

"No such thing!" Jay called following down the line and flipping after, unable to see Bucky's rolling eyes.

"Spoken like a true disciple." He jerked the line just so and it retracted, sharply, into a unit on his bag's strap. "Don't you ever want to say 'it's just a goddamn knife, chief, it's got nothing to do with bats'?"

Jay shrugged, watching the street more than Bucky. "Hey, if it makes the man happy."

"Things make the man happy?" He glanced over his shoulder out of sheer instinct -- it'd be impossible for someone to be following them unseen at this point, right? "I don't think you can make a case for that one." He came up next to Jay, and took in the scene. He jerked his head left, with a lift of his eyebrows. He'd trust Jay if he said that wasn't the best way to cross, here.

"Less miserable," he offered a correction before they went silent. He looked left then nodded, moving across carefully.

Bucky snorted then crossed after him, covering their backs when Jay scouted forward. He pitched his voice low as they came up to the wall. "You got a bat-something-to-get-past-that-silent-alarm-system?"

Jay waggled his eyebrows above his domino mask, "Yeah, bat acrobatics."

The older man looked skyward for half a second, a silent prayer of _why me?_ "I come all the way to Gotham, and I don't get to see any of the infamous toys?"

"Nope," Jay said cheerfully. "Not until you tell me why you're here."

Cheery his ass. Bucky gave him a darkish look again. "I'm looking for some information." He peered at the window and shucked off his backpack again, trying to assess just what sort of alarm system it was. "I suppose you want more than that."

"Yeah, a bit," Jay said, watching the dust on the floor show up the tiny red lines of the alarm system.

"His organization's expanding." He pulled out a small plastic unit and attached it to the window frame. "Apparently someone's made Gotham too hot to stick around." He smirked. A flick of a switch turned on the unit on. That's one piece disabled... he eased the window open. "I'm trying to decide if I should let it."

"Expand?"

"Yes. He might be the lesser evil." He carefully leaned in the window, trying to map out the laser trips on the floor.

"Than?" Jay pulled him back, pointing to a horizonal trip.

He lifted his chin in thanks and pulled out a spray can. Fake snow. Heh. Tis the season, right? He shook it lightly before popping off the cap. "Than the thugs he'll push out."

Jay eyed him for a minute as the fake snow sprayed across the warehouse floor, lighting up the trips. Their eyes moved almost in synch as they mapped it out and committed it to memory, and glanced at one another. "Hn." Brucelike. Jay was rather proud.

Stevelike. Bucky sighed again. "Ready?"

"Go."

\----------------

Six hours later, they were stretched out in Bucky's safe house, empty bottles tidly piled up by the door, stolen papers and records spread out around them.

"Frozen?"

"Frozen." Bucky shook his head. "He gets frozen, and I get cybernetic limbs and a bad reputation."

"And PTSD." Jay was nothing if not helpful. He took a drink and opened one of the last few files.

"We all get PTSD." Bucky dug into the bag from the deli, finding one last sandwich and tearing it in two, easily. "I don't think they've got a name for my psychology."

"Point." He reached out a hand without looking for his portion of the sandwich. "We also all get screwed."

"... what?"

"Sidekicks."

"Hn." Bucky flopped back down. "I'm not anymore."

"I don't know if you get to make that call."

"Sometimes, you just have to make that call." He took a long drink and flipped over a reciept, then shook his head. "And this one. I'm not letting him move out." He closed the file. "He's not the lesser of evils."

"Hn." Jay nodded, meditatively, and then shot Bucky a look. "Let's not sit on this."

Bucky gave him a look.

Jay responded with a grin. "Make you a deal. Help me burn the rat out, I'll let you use some of my toys."

There was a short pause, and then Bucky snorted. "No need." He waved his hand, easily. "I've got my own."

  



End file.
